Tuesday, June 09, 2015

How not to start a presidential campaign

I'm glad I'm not the only one who thinks Jeb Bush's campaign has been a disaster so far. No, Jeb Bush's campaign apparently thinks the same thing.

First Read notes that it's not that unusual for a presidential campaign to change managers when things aren't going well. But it is odd for that to happen before the campaign officially begins.

And that's why yesterday's news that Jeb Bush hired GOP communications strategist Danny Diaz to be his new campaign manager -- after previously tapping David Kochel (who was Mitt Romney's chief Iowa strategist in 2012) to fill the position -- is a big deal. It's a tacit acknowledgement that the last few months for Team Jeb haven't gone well. If the goal of the Jeb pre-campaign was to create enough of a juggernaut to scare off some potential rivals, it didn't work.

Not only did that not work but it has actually made candidates who in truth should have sat on their hands offer themselves up or seriously consider it.

Think about it. It's like the schoolyard bully trying to make himself so feared that no one will challenge him instead being so pathetic that there's a lineup to punch him in the nose.

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Tomorrow, I have an article coming out that looks at polling of Iowa Republicans regarding which candidates they will not consider voting for. It's interesting in that it shows that candidates who have some actual support are nonstarters -- like Trump and Christie. But Bush doesn't do much better. Looking at the field's "will consider voting for" numbers, Bush comes in 12th place. Things could change, but this is a very bad sign for him.